At least 242 people were arrested Saturday after militant abortion protesters descended on a Los Angeles women's clinic during a violence-marred, seven-hour siege that capped a week of abortion rights protests in Southern California. The demonstration, organized by the national anti-abortion group Operation Rescue, failed to shut down the Mid-Wilshire clinic.

On the eve of what is expected to be a watershed Supreme Court decision, pro- and anti-abortion forces faced off Saturday in the largest show of strength so far in a planned six-week protest at Milwaukee abortion clinics. Several hundred chanting abortion rights supporters locked arms before the entrance of a downtown clinic to repel an estimated 700 anti-abortion protesters who tried to keep women from entering the facility.

When Andrew Burnett walked out of a bitterly divisive summit meeting of anti-abortion leaders in Chicago last April, he became convinced that it was time to create a new national organization--run by and for activists who could no longer abide the tactics of moderation.

A man was convicted Friday of making terrorist threats against a single mother of seven who had stood up to gang members in her tough North Hollywood neighborhood. Maximilliano Guerrero, 20, of Lynwood, faces up to six years in state prison for making a terrorist threat--pointing his finger at Viviana Guerra and saying, "Bang, bang, you're dead, bitch."

In the war over abortion, plans are executed with the precision of an early morning coup. When Operation Rescue California takes its latest shot at protesting abortions by blockading the entrance to one chosen clinic Saturday, not even its troops will be told the location until early that morning, when it's time to be ferried there. Ditto for everyone else, reporters included.

More than 300 jailed Operation Rescue demonstrators jammed Los Angeles arraignment courts Monday, withholding their names for hours in their determination to go on trial to further publicize their contention that abortion is murder. The arraignment process moved with excruciating slowness--just as the arrestees intended. By late Monday night, only 17 of them had been released, and it looked as though a great number would spend another night in jail.

About 250 anti-abortion demonstrators were arrested Thursday for blockading an Orange County family planning clinic, but organizers expressed dismay that more did not participate in the opening of a three-day civil disobedience campaign.

Almost 1,000 anti-abortion and pro-choice activists squared off outside two Pico Boulevard women's clinics Saturday in a five-hour standoff that marked the introduction to Los Angeles of Operation Rescue, a group that has introduced 1960s-style protest tactics to the anti-abortion movement. As one side sang "Amazing Grace" the other shouted: "Not the church! Not the state! Women must decide their fate!" About 75 police in riot gear stood by.

March 25, 1989 | RUSSELL CHANDLER and JOHN DART, Times Religion Writers

The militant Operation Rescue anti-abortion movement has divided the ranks of Southern California Christians and stirred moderate opposition from pro-choice clergy. But the vast majority of religious leaders--already immersed in Holy Week activities--stayed on the sidelines, in part because of disagreement over the protesters' tactics of civil disobedience and fundamentalist rhetoric.